Allied Bank for a start failed to defend its Grade I title when it was soundly trounced by Agricultural Development Bank of Pakistan (ADBP) in the final of the eight team tournament played at the Arbab Niaz Stadium in Peshawar. To be fair, the bankers were playing the final without their top stars including captain Rameez Raja, Aaqib Javed, Aamer Sohail Ata-ur-Rehman, Amer Nazir and their two most proficient performers on the domestic circuit, all rounders Aamer Hanif and Manzoor Akhtar, who had played a vital role in guiding their team through the preliminary rounds and in the semi-final against United Bank. Aamer Hanif infact scored 117 runs in the knockout match. Even stand-in skipper Shahid Mahboob who had been at the centre of some controversies in the earlier games because of the ball tampering charges against him made by opposing teams, could not reproduce his earlier bowling form and thus the ADBP batsmen got a decent score setting up a 212 runs victory, Atif Rauf who toured New Zealand in 1994 with Pakistan team, emerging as the top scorer with 84 in the final. In the Grade II non-first class tournament, Pakistan Customs atlast won the final to win the right to play in the first class version of the competition in the next season. Customs came out with an exciting win over Pakistan Steel, with skipper Haris Khan winning the Man of the final award for his splended off-spin bowling and brave batting.
Customs who last season were narrowly beaten by KRL in the final, this time got sweet revenge when they disposed off the Islamabad based team in the last four stage. The Patrons Trophy competitions this season were significant for one reason, which was that the discarded Test players wanting to make a comeback into the national team took the tournament very seriously and appeared regularly for their departsments. Examples being Rashid Latif, who led United Bank, fast bowler Waqar Younis and leg-spinner Mushtaq Ahmed, whose haul of 6-56 and 4-78 in his first match on the domestic circuit since returning from England, helped a great deal in his comeback to the international circuit. Mushtaq got his ten wickets haul against Habib Bank in a preliminary game played at Jinnah Stadium, Sialkot.
The surprise package of the Grade I competition were no doubt Pakistan National Shipping Corporation (PNSC) who performed many giant killing acts, but found the going too tough in the semi-final against ADBP. The skippers came into the last four stage with three big wins. It was a tribute to the PNSC outfit that th ey recovered from a nine wickets drubbing at the hands of United Bank in the first round to fightback with victories over Allied Bank, Railways and Habib Bank. They also managed to hold the strong PIA and ADBP outfits to winning draws. Their batting line up performed impressively all the time, Mazhar Qayyum, Sohail Jaffer and Azam Khan batting most consistently except for the semifinal when the skippers were skittled out for just 68 runs in 29.2 overs by the ADBP pacers Manzoor Elahi 6- 32 and Mohammad Ali 4-34. After falling for such a low score the skippers required a miracle to stage another fightback, but the bankers put the result beyond doubt by rattling up a first innings total of 570 in reply, skipper Mansoor Rana top scoring with 188 runs, followed by Nadeem Younis 91 runs. Eventually Bankers won that semifinal by an innings and 263 runs.
As far as the two big names were concerned, PIA and United Bank, their performance was creditable till the last stages of the preliminary rounds. The airlines were infact unlucky not to start off with an innings win over Railways, when skipper Asif Mujtaba had even managed to enforce the follow-on. Heavy rain washed out the game, with PIA headed for a big win. United Bank in contrast did just that in their opener trouncing PNSC by nine wickets in Rawalpindi. Habib Bank an other big name on the domestic circuit playing without its bigwigs Javed Miandad, Saleem Malik, Ijaz Ahmed and Akram Raza, kept on producing pathetic form, as reports about infighting came out and it became obvious that the bankers were not being allowed by the Pakistan cricket board to field Saleem, Ijaz and Akram, all regular Test playes until last March before the bribery scandal broke out. National Bank, last season`s semifinalist also could not achieve anything off noteworthy of their reputation as their key all-rounder Naeem Ashraf was out due to a knee injury sustained while playing in league cricket. All-rounder Zafar Iqbal, could also not reproduce the consistent form with bat and ball which had won him a place in the national team.
The Patrons Trophy Grade I competition this season also saw the Pakistan Board enforcing strictly the concept of match referees, though obviously this system still requires to be perfected by the Domestic Tournament Monitoring Committee. In some cases the system worked as in the final, match referee Ethtishamudin fined Allied Bank captain Shahid Mahboob for swearing and sledging, a decision endorsed by the DTMC. The most important aspect this premier tournament for organisations and departments, which needs to be paid urgent attention is the condition at some the grounds, where the preliminary round matches were held.
Date-stamped : 11 Feb96 - 18:18